Robe à la française
Also: sack-back gown, sacque
The robe à la française is an eighteenth-century gown whose back falls from the shoulders in loose box pleats, open at the front over a stomacher and petticoat.
The robe à la française, or sack-back gown, is recognisable from behind: two pairs of deep box pleats fall loose from the neckline to the floor, ending in a slight train. At the front the gown is open, showing a decorated stomacher and a matching petticoat, usually over panniers.
Why “Watteau pleats”?
The back pleats are often called Watteau pleats because they appear in the paintings of Antoine Watteau. The name is a later one, from the nineteenth century, not a term used in the eighteenth.
How formal was it?
By the 1770s it was one of the most formal gowns a woman could wear, second only to court dress.
Sources
- Sack-back gown with skirt (robe à la française), ca. 1775–85, BK-2011-7. Rijksmuseum
- Sack, saque, robe à la française. Colonial Williamsburg Foundation
- Sack-back gown. Wikipedia
See also
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